Naked, lost airline pilot charged after search

Jeffrey Paul Bradford and Adrianna Grace Connor should have just gone back to their motel room Sunday night, according to Lower Swatara Twp. police.

Instead, Bradford, 24, a pilot for Pinnacle Airlines Inc., and Connor, a flight attendant for the airline, left Angies Diner on Eisenhower Boulevard and walked to nearby woods along Richardson Road.

"They told the officer they wanted to go do it in the woods, essentially," said Sgt. Richard Brandt. "That's the best answer they had."

Bradford, of Moon Twp. in the Pittsburgh suburbs, wound up naked and wandering in the woods, triggering a search that involved a state police helicopter with body-heat-sensing gear, authorities said.

The pilot -- who police found shortly before midnight -- had been scheduled to fly out of Harrisburg International Airport to Detroit at 7:30 a.m. Monday, a Pinnacle Airlines official said.

Instead, Bradford and Connor, 24, of Belleville, Mich., appeared before a district judge Monday and were released on $10,000 bail each.

"We would have a zero-tolerance policy for actions of the type alleged in this instance," said Joe Williams, a spokesman for the Memphis-based airline.

Bradford and Connor have been suspended pending an investigation, he said.

The search began after Robert Furlong, the township fire chief, heard noises outside his Richardson Road home sometime after 9 p.m. Sunday and found Connor in his duty vehicle, police said.

"She said the reason she got into the [vehicle] was to look for a flashlight to find her friend," Brandt said.